VII
Varvara had no knowledge of Peredonov’s trip. She passed an extremely distressing night.
When Peredonov returned to town in the morning he did not go home, but asked to be driven to church—it was time for Mass. It seemed dangerous to him now not to go to church often—they might inform against him if he did not.
At the church gate he met a pleasant-looking schoolboy, with a rosy, ingenuous face and innocent blue eyes. Peredonov said to him:
“Hullo there, Mashenka, hullo, girlie!”
Misha Koudryavtsev flushed painfully. Peredonov often teased him by calling him “Mashenka”—Misha did not understand why and could not make up his mind to complain. A number of his companions, stupid youngsters elbowing each other, laughed at Peredonov’s words. They too liked to tease Misha.
The church, dedicated to the prophet Elias, an old structure built in the days of Tsar Mikhail, stood in the square, facing the school. For this reason, on church holidays, at Mass and for Vespers, the schoolboys had to gather here and to stand in rows on the left by the chapel of St. Catherine the Martyr, while behind them stood one of the assistant masters in order to keep discipline. Here also in a row, nearer the centre of the church, stood the form masters, as well as the inspector and the Headmaster, with their families. It was usual for nearly all the orthodox schoolboys to gather here, except the few who were permitted to attend their parish churches with their parents.
The choir of schoolboys sang well, and for this reason the church was attended by merchants of the First Guild, officials and the families of landed gentry. There were only a few of the common folk—especially since, in conformity with the Headmaster’s wish, Mass was celebrated there later than in other churches.
Peredonov stood in his usual place, from which he could see all the members of the choir. Screwing up his eyes, he looked at them and thought that they were standing out of their places. If he had been inspector he would have pulled them up. There was, for example, a smooth-faced boy, named Kramarenko, a small, thin, fidgety youngster who was constantly turning this way and that way, whispering, smiling—and there was no one to keep him in order. It seemed to be no one’s affair.
“What confusion!” thought Peredonov. “These choirboys are all good-for-nothings. That dark youngster there has a fine, clear soprano—so he thinks he can whisper and grin in church.”
And Peredonov frowned.
At his side stood a latecomer, the inspector of the National Schools, Sergey Potapovitch Bogdanov, an oldish man with a brown, stupid face, who always looked as if he wanted to explain to somebody something which he could never make head or tail of himself. No one was easier to frighten or to astonish than Bogdanov: no sooner did he hear anything new or disquieting than his forehead would become wrinkled from his inward, painful efforts and from his mouth would issue a string of incoherent and perplexed exclamations.
Peredonov bent towards him and said in a whisper:
“One of your schoolmistresses walks about in a red shirt!”
Bogdanov was alarmed. His white Adam’s apple twitched with fear under his chin.
“What do you say?” he whispered hoarsely. “Who is she?”
“The loud-voiced, fat one—I don’t know what her name is,” whispered Peredonov.
“The loud-voiced one, the loud-voiced one,” repeated Bogdanov in a confused way, “that must be Skobotchkina. Yes?”
“Yes, that must be the one,” declared Peredonov.
“Well! Good heavens! Who’d have thought that!” exclaimed Bogdanov. “Skobotchkina in a red shirt! Well! Did you see it with your own eyes?”
“Yes, I saw her, and they tell me she goes into school like that. And sometimes even worse; she puts on a sarafan14 and walks about like a common girl.”
“You don’t say so! I must look into it! We can’t have that! We can’t have that! She’ll have to be dismissed, dismissed, I say,” babbled on Bogdanov. “She was always like that.”
Mass was over. As they were leaving the church, Peredonov said to Kramarenko:
“Here, you whippety-snippet! Why were you grinning in church? Just wait, I shall tell your father!”
Kramarenko looked at Peredonov in astonishment and ran past him without speaking. He belonged to that number of pupils who thought Peredonov coarse, stupid and unjust, and who therefore disliked and despised him. The majority of the pupils thought similarly. Peredonov imagined that these were the boys who had been prejudiced against him by the Headmaster, if not personally, at least through his sons.
Peredonov was approached on the other side of the fence by Volodin. He was chuckling happily, and his face was as cheerful as if it were his birthday; he wore a bowler hat and carried his cane in the fashionable way.
“I’ve something to tell you, Ardalyon Borisitch,” he said gleefully. “I’ve managed to persuade Cherepnin, and very soon he’s going to smear Marta’s gate with tar!”
Peredonov said nothing for a moment. He seemed to be considering something, and then suddenly burst into his usual morose laughter. Volodin at once ceased grinning, assumed a sober look, straightened his bowler hat, looked at the sky, swung his stick and said:
“It’s a fine day, but it looks as if it will rain this evening. Well, let it rain; I shall spend the evening at the future inspector’s house.”
“I can’t waste any time at home now,” said Peredonov, “I’ve got more important affairs to attend to in town.”
Volodin looked as if he comprehended, though he really had no idea what business Peredonov had to attend to. Peredonov determined that he must, without fail, make several visits. Yesterday’s chance meeting with the Lieutenant-Colonel had suggested to him an idea which now seemed to him very important: to make the rounds of all important personages of the town to assure them of his loyalty. If he should succeed, then, in an emergency, Peredonov would find defenders in the town who would testify to the correctness of his attitude.
“Where are you going, Ardalyon Borisitch?” asked Volodin, seeing that Peredonov was turning off from the path by which he usually went back from church. “Aren’t you going home?”
“Yes, I’m going home,” answered Peredonov, “but I don’t like to go along that street now.”
“Why?”
“There’s a lot of durman growing there, and the smell’s very strong. I’m very much affected by it—it stupefies me. My nerves are on edge just now. I seem to have nothing but worries.”
Volodin’s face once more assumed a comprehending and sympathetic expression.
On the way Peredonov pulled off some thistle-heads and put them in his pocket.
“What do you want those thistle-heads for?” asked Volodin with a grin.
“For the cat,” answered Peredonov gruffly.
“Are you going to stick them in its fur?” asked Volodin.
“Yes.”
Volodin sniggered.
“Don’t begin without me,” he cried.
Peredonov asked him to come in at once, but Volodin declared that he had an appointment: he suddenly felt that it wasn’t the right thing not to have appointments; Peredonov’s words about his affairs had inspired him with the idea that it would be well for him to visit the Adamenko girl on his own, and to tell her that he had some new, splendid drawings which needed framing—perhaps she would like to look at them. “In any case,” thought Volodin, “Nadezhda Vassilyevna will ask me to have a cup of coffee.”
And so that was what Volodin did. He suddenly invented another scheme: he proposed to Nadezhda Vassilyevna that her brother should take up carpentry. Nadezhda Vassilyevna imagined that Volodin was in need of money, and she immediately consented. They agreed to work for two hours three times a week, for which Volodin was to get thirty roubles a month. Volodin was in raptures—here was some cash and the possibility of frequent meetings with Nadezhda Vassilyevna.
Peredonov returned home gloomy as usual. Varvara, pale from her sleepless night, grumbled:
“You might have told me yesterday that you weren’t coming home.”
Peredonov provoked her by saying maliciously that he had been on a trip with Marta. Varvara was silent. She held the Princess’s letter in her hand. It was a forged letter, but still—.
She said to him at luncheon, with a meaning smile:
“While you were gadding about with Marfushka, I received an answer from the Princess.”
“I didn’t know you wrote to her.” Peredonov’s face lighted up with a gleam of dull expectation.
“Well, that’s good! Didn’t you yourself tell me to write?”
“Well, what did she say?” asked Peredonov with some agitation.
“Here’s the letter—read it for yourself.”
Varvara fumbled for a long time in her pockets and finally found the letter and gave it to Peredonov. He stopped eating and grabbed the letter eagerly. He read it and was overjoyed. Here at last was a clear and definite promise. At the moment no doubts entered his mind. He quickly finished his luncheon and went out to show the letter to his acquaintances and friends.
With a grim animation he entered Vershina’s garden. Vershina, as nearly always, was standing at the gate smoking. She was very pleased: formerly, she had to lure him in, now he came in himself. Vershina thought:
“That comes of his going on a trip with Marta; he spent some time with her and now he’s come again. I wonder if he means to propose to her?”
Peredonov disillusioned her immediately by showing her the letter.
“You kept disbelieving it,” he said, “and here the Princess has written. Read that and see for yourself.”
Vershina looked incredulously at the letter, quickly blew tobacco smoke on it several times running, made a wry smile and asked quietly and quickly:
“But where’s the envelope?”
Peredonov suddenly felt alarmed. He suspected that Varvara was trying to deceive him and had written the letter herself. He must get the envelope from her at once.
“I don’t know,” he said, “I must ask.”
He said goodbye to Vershina and went quickly back to his own house. It was absolutely necessary for him to assure himself as soon as possible of the source of the letter—the sudden doubt tormented him. Vershina, standing at the gate, looked after him with her wry smile, rapidly puffing out cigarette smoke, as if she were trying to finish the cigarette like a tiresome lesson.
Peredonov came running home with a frightened and tormented face, and while yet in the passage he shouted in a voice hoarse with agitation:
“Varvara! Where’s the envelope?”
“What envelope?” asked Varvara in a trembling voice.
She looked at Peredonov insolently and would have flushed had she not been already rouged.
“The envelope, from the Princess, of the letter you gave me today,” explained Peredonov, with a look half-frightened, half-malignant.
Varvara gave a forced laugh.
“I burnt it. What good was it to me?” she said. “Why should I keep it? I’m not making a collection of envelopes. You can’t get any money for envelopes. You can only get money for empty bottles at a pub.”
Peredonov walked gloomily about the rooms and growled:
“There are all sorts of Princesses—we know that. Perhaps this Princess lives here.”
Varvara pretended not to understand his suspicions, but yet trembled violently.
When, towards evening, Peredonov strolled past Vershina’s cottage, she stopped him.
“Have you found the envelope?” she asked.
“Vara tells me she burnt it.”
Vershina laughed, and the white, thin clouds of tobacco smoke wavered before her in the quiet, cool air.
“It’s strange,” she said, “that your cousin is so careless. Here’s an important letter—and no envelope! You might have been able to tell from the postmark when it was sent and where from.”
Peredonov was extremely irritated. In vain Vershina invited him into the garden; in vain she promised to look in the cards for him—Peredonov left.
Nevertheless, he showed the letter to his friends and boasted. And his friends believed him.
But Peredonov did not know whether to believe or not. At all events, he decided to begin on Tuesday his round of visits to important personages in the town to strengthen his position. He decided not to begin on Monday, as it was an unlucky day.